Property tax system unfair to retirees

I am a retiree who has received a significant increase in my property tax bill in the past three years. One of the main reasons for the increase in my current tax bill is a substantial decrease in the homeowner’s exemption amount. Who initiated this decrease, and for what purpose?

The school tax portion of my tax bill is 67 percent of my total bill. I sincerely believe that the school tax portion of the state’s revenue should be transferred to the state income tax.

The senior retirees have no children in these schools and by and large do not pay a substantial amount in state income tax because most of their income is in the form of pensions, Social Security and IRA withdrawals, which are not taxable by the state.

The above comments are not new, but I sincerely believe that their imposition would greatly reduce the property tax increases that are causing severe financial burdens on senior retirees who are on fixed incomes.

Casey Bachanowski

Hoffman Estates